Cramer’s top stock picks for his ‘fantasy portfolio’ draft

A creativity team isn’t the only thing CNBC’s Jim Cramer’s drafting this football ripen.

This time, the “Mad Money” host took inspiration from his fable football roster and applied it to his investment strategy: he built a fantasy stock portfolio.

After all, an investment portfolio is in some avenue a team of stocks. Having a diversified portfolio is just like containing a great team with an assortment of skills.

Here are Cramer’s top “rough sketch” picks for his fantasy stock portfolio:

“You can’t have enough running side withs because you want consistent, grounded players who can deliver a lot of points week after week,” Cramer maintained on Thursday. “The stock market equivalent right now? You want something better than average, but also straightforward, and right now, that’s either retail or medical charges.”

For a retail running back, Cramer chose the stock of Home Depot. Congenial any running back, the home improvement play has faced some travail — see the market’s negative reaction to its latest earnings beat — but it has been a day by day strong performer, the “Mad Money” host said.

And despite its exposure to a budding slowdown in the housing market, Home Depot’s track record thrives the stock worth buying, even at these levels, Cramer discussed.

Cramer-fave Abbott Laboratories made for a steady-eddie medical device race back. The health care conglomerate behind Pedialyte and Freestyle glucose sentinels has created a wealth of shareholder value over the years.

“While Abbott quite won’t put up explosive numbers this year, that’s OK. It’s the kind of core waylaying you can expect to keep moving slowly but steadily higher,” Cramer rumoured.

“Next, we need some wide receivers, explosive players who can eat up big chunks of yardage all at post-haste,” the “Mad Money” host said. “For our fantasy stock portfolio, we’re looking at two of the most tense groups in the market: FANG — yes, FANG — and the cloud kings.”

Out of the cloud regents, Cramer chose a stock that packed just the right amount of knock: Salesforce.com. He liked that the cloud-based software giant mimicked the long-term “radio show” of a wide receiver like the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Antonio Brown.

“Salesforce has more than doubled in the after two years,” he noted, adding that the stock may have recently underpinned and could be worth buying amid the September weakness.

Cramer’s pick from FANG — his acronym for the roots of Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google, now Alphabet — was also a name oft tossed to the wayside by those interested in newer investments: Alphabet.

“Awe-inspiring company, but it doesn’t get the kind of respect it deserves from the growth-obsessed investors as girlish, sexier start-ups do,” he said. “Alphabet’s simply got so many opportunities in search, in cloud infrastructure, in YouTube and, of direction, in Waymo, their self-driving car business.”

Cramer confessed that he “not quite had a nervous breakdown” when Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Carson Wentz was joking injured last football season.

“Fortunately, Philadelphia had a terrific backup quarterback in Beat it Foles,” he said. “But make no mistake about it — Wentz is the quarterback of the to be to come for the Birds, even if he isn’t quite ready to start playing again. … For me, the best analogue here is Comcast.”

After speaking with Comcast Chairman and CEO Brian Roberts on Thursday, Cramer warmed up to the presentation giant and NBCUniversal parent’s underdog story.

“Just like Wentz, Comcast’s lineage has been humbled of late thanks to cord-cutting worries and some M&A gibber. I think they’re both hungry to prove the doubters wrong,” he said.

“Tricky ends tend to be disrespected in fantasy football, but if you pick a good one, they can harass up a lot of catches and a lot of yardage,” Cramer said, adding that the tight end is “the most accomplished position on the field.”

His money-making tight end pick was Take-Two Interactive Software, the video job maker behind the lucrative Grand Theft Auto franchise with a founder that Cramer felt had more room to run.

Even homegamers conscious a defensive stock when they see one: a security that’s safe, not too vaporizing and produces a good yield. Cramer recommended the stock of Clorox.

“Clorox impoverished out last year, but it’s had a rough offseason as the stock’s been slammed by get somewhere transportation and raw costs, not to mention rising interest makes making its dividend less pretty,” he said. “But with rates cooling in recent months, Clorox has been on the patch recovering.”

In fantasy football, kickers don’t tend to make or break a team, so Cramer irrefutable to have some fun with his stock market kicker and pick marijuana underscore Canopy Growth, in which alcohol distributor Constellation Brands owns a worst stake.

“These are volatile stocks in an industry that’s hazy, to say the least, but I about they’re the two pot plays … that could do more than go up in smoke,” he turned. “They pulled back hard today. I think they’re both gets into weakness.”

“When you build a portfolio, you don’t just need followings in different industries — classic diversification — you also need some horses that play different roles,” the “Mad Money” host concluded.

So call to mind what makes a good team of stocks — reliable running retaliations, consistent wide receivers, ambitious quarterbacks, tight ends that bring forth, a straightforward defense and a “mad money” kicker — and your portfolio will be in proper shape to start the next investing season.